Wednesday, 22 July 2015

Anderson, William - Private (31297)

William Anderson was born in Baxenden in 1887 and was baptised at Baxenden Methodist Church. He was the son of William and Margaret Anderson. In 1901 William was living at 682, Industrial Terrace, Rising Bridge, with his parents, brothers John and Thomas and sisters Rhoda, Margaret, Sarah, Mary Alice, and Florence. William was aged 13 at that time and was employed as a cotton weaver. On 4 January 1913 he married Annie Parkinson at St. John’s Church, Baxenden. His address at that time was 3, Hazel Street, Rising Bridge and his occupation was that of a spinner. On 11 September 1914 William and Annie had a son, Alan, who was baptised on 7 January 1915 at Baxenden Methodist Chapel. At that time they lived at 500, Manchester Road, Baxenden. Before the war William was a member of the St. John Ambulance Brigade in Accrington. He originally enlisted in the East Lancashire Regiment (40998) but was later transferred to the Loyal North Lancashire's. He was killed in action on Thursday 17 October 1918. He was 31 years old.

The following letter from Major-General E. P. Strickland, commanding the 1st Division shows the appreciation shown to the 1st Battalion, the Loyal North Lancashire Regiment just before William’s death.

“It gives me particular pleasure to forward the attached, and to express my admiration of the fine spirit shown by the 1st Loyal North Lancashire and the 1st Cameron Highlanders on this occasion. Nor is this the only occasion on which they have very materially assisted other divisions, in addition to carrying out their own task; their action at Sequehart showed a fine soldierly spirit and unselfish and wholehearted devotion to duty. Any troops may well be glad to be associated with them in action.”

During the operations commencing in September and enduring until the end of October, the losses suffered by the Battalion appear to have been heavier than any other period of the war; when fighting was practically continuous, and the periods of rest, during which no man was safe from the German long-range guns, were but short, it does not always seem to have been possible for the casualties to be fully recorded in the Battalion War Diary as they occurred, and some may inadvertently have been omitted, while others again may possibly have been recorded more than once. The following may, however, perhaps be accepted as a tolerably accurate statement of the losses suffered by the Battalion during the “Hundred Days”

Officers killed – 9; wounded – 25; missing – 2.

Other ranks killed – 113; wounded 511; missing – 50.

From - The Loyal North Lancashire Regiment, vol. 2, 1914-1918, by H.C. Wylly.

William Anderson was one of the casualties and is buried at Busigny Communal Cemetery Extension, France.Newspaper Memorial:In loving memory of Private William Anderson, 1st Loyal North Lancashire's, killed in action in France, October 17th 1918, aged 31 years."Could we have raised his dying head,And heard his last farewell,The grief would not have been so hard,For these who loved him well.Too far away thy grave to see,But not too far to think of thee.From his sorrowing Wife and Alan.Ever remembered by his sorrowing Father, Mother, Sisters and Brother Tom (in France) and Family, 3 Hazel Street, Rising Bridge.

This is a very special blog, which hopefully is a comprehensive, and permanent record of all our past brave soldiers from Haslingden and Helmshore who lost their lives in either World War One or World War Two.

The research and compilation has been carried out by Jacqueline Ramsbottom of Haslingden Roots in conjunction with Bryan Yorke of Haslingden Old and New who has been responsible for the typing from newspaper transcript of WW1 soldiers and the site construction and day to day administration of the site etc.

If you have information or photos you would like added to the blog then contact Jackie at: Jax1956@googlemail.com

Or if you have any queries with regards to text errors, or site construction etc., then please contact Bryan at: bryan.yorke@sky.com

We are indebted to the late William Turner who did so much research on these brave soldiers and we are so grateful that his previous work has been allowed to be incorporated within this more recent work.

Also we would like to thank Jennifer Shilliday for kindly allowing us to use her superb photo of the Haslingden Memorial for our main header and also as a sub header on most of the soldiers individual reports.

We also wish to acknowledge that the Census Certificates printed below each soldier are "Crown Copyright".

We also thank and acknowledge the photos and inscriptions of the war memorials which wherever possible have been included at the end of each soldier's blog, and some of these photos are copyrighted to the "Commonwealth War Graves Commission". (We are hoping to add these photos in due course)

A lot of the research which has included Notes and also Memorials has been gained from transcripts or notices taken from the original Haslingden Guardian newspaper from that period.

My apologies for typo errors which will have occurred throughout the listings and are being corrected when found during regular audits.

You can just simply scroll down the main blog page on the right hand side and every now and again you will need to click on where it says "older post" or you can shortcut direct to the soldier by clicking over the soldiers name above to bring up their individual page

for the following click over the name and then scroll down until you reached the subject of your choice